Thursday, November 28, 2002

Patrick and I spent the morning cleaning and preparing for our Thanksgiving feast. Patrick got all his dishes prepared in the morning, and after I vaccumed and cleaned the bathroom I made pumpkin bread and made an emergency run to the grocery for eggs, butter, and ice. Amy and David showed up before noon in a day-rented green VW New Beetle from City Carshare. They helped us cook all day. We each had one leftover pizza slice for a snack. (I really couldn't call that lunch.) Yuichi, Patrick's friend from Mandarin class, showed up on his bicycle around 4:00 PM. Patrick's ex-boyfriend Sam showed up shortly thereafter. While waiting for dinner, we nibbled on the pumpkin bread I made and white cheddar CheezIts. The six of us feasted on: Amy and David's shrimp cocktail appetizer (a family tradition of Amy's); Patrick's 12-pound Sage and Parsley Roasted Turkey with gravy, oyster dressing, shrimp-stuffed mirlitons, sweet potato casserole with persimmons and roasted chestnuts, and buttered corn on the cob; Amy's cranberry sauce, Amy's broccolini with pine nuts and parmesan, and Andronico's olive bread and sourdough baguette. For dessert, we had Amy's homemade apple pie, Amy's homemade pumpkin pie, and a pecan pie that Sam bought from Just Desserts. Patrick, Amy, and Yuichi made whipped cream from scratch to top off all the desserts. Amy and David shared a new discovery with us: a served-hot, sweet-tasting Scandinavian beverage called Glögg which they found at the grocery. Patrick said, "To me it tasted like a cider. Not apple, though. More like a grape cider." As we were eating dinner, Sam got a call from Sam and Patrick's friend Adrienne Katner, who had arrived earlier than we had expected. She and her ex-boyfriend Armando and her brother Kent drove up from Los Angeles where she is just starting a PhD program in public health at UCLA. We invited them over to have some food, and soon we had 9 people in our tiny in-law apartment. The sink filled up with dishes maybe 5 or 6 times after successive rounds of washings. People took leftovers home, and we still had a lot of food left over. Everyone left at around 7:00 PM, and Patrick subsequently collapsed on the floor from exhaustion.